The Leaping Lords of Chang
by moonswirl
Summary: Gleekathon, day sixty-one: 12 Days of Gleekmas, Day 10: Mike's been working on a special project on his own.


_Started my daily ficlets to make the hiatus pass, then decided to keep going with a second cycle. Now entering the seventh through ninth weeks, here comes cycle 3 of my gleekathon!_

_I wanted to do something Christmas-y, but not overly so, but then the song was perfect for this. So the stories in and of themselves aren't Christmas-themed, just the thing that inspired them is ;) You'll see :)_

_So presenting... **The 12 Days of Gleekmas - Day 10:** Mike + "Ten Lords A'Leaping"_

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**"The Leaping Lords of Chang"  
Mike**

It hadn't started off as that much of a project. It had just been something he'd do in the basement, at school when he'd be on his own… or bored in class. He'd imagine some kind of out of this world production. It was always just a thing he'd think about as a fantasy, something that would never be more than what it was at that time.

After he'd joined Glee Club, that was when things had started to change. That was when he'd gone from aimless ideas to… well, aim. All those little bits that had been ricocheting through his head for so long went down on paper. He didn't know what he was going to do with them yet, but he had to figure if they were stuck so deep in his mind, then they had to be important.

One of the first things he'd considered was how many dancers to involve. The number would change back and forth for about a week or so. He'd think it was set, and then he'd realize… no, that wasn't right. He'd go back and calculate again… He wasn't sure of how to go about these things yet, so taking time made sense.

The number had finally stuck with him for a good three days, and he'd officially locked it in… ten dancers.

He'd kept all of it to himself. It wasn't shame… It was his thing, his idea, his project… And when it'd be done, then he'd be able to say he'd done it, all of it… He'd seen it through. He'd never carried out anything like that on his own… He wanted to accomplish something.

He'd started dancing a couple years back. He'd seen a guy on television and was just drawn in to the things he was doing. He'd started off just trying to imitate him. That one had led him to try emulating a few more people before he really started taking it seriously, worked at his skills.

Then he'd joined the football team. It wasn't as though he had many opportunities for it there. Puck had caught him dancing around one day. He was sure that was probably one of the reasons why he'd come to him when he'd gone and recruited him and Matt to join Glee Club with him.

It had kick started something in him. He didn't know any other way to explain it. The lights had been turned on, the stage was primed… now all he had to do was step on it and go.

He'd taken to going into the empty auditorium and allow the size of the stage to really give him a chance to unleash all the ideas bouncing in his head to bounce around the space, like a model. He was on his own, he didn't have other dancers to put the ideas into concrete motion unless he did it himself, but then that could never really give him a good image like standing back, looking at the stage and playing his mind's eye like a projector. He could get so much more out of it like that.

He wasn't sure what he was going to do with it once he was done with it. He had no idea how it could go from his head to an actual performance, with an audience, dancers… It was another one of the things he'd known he'd need to figure out. He knew for sure that, if he ever decided to present it, he wasn't going to let anything stand in his way. He'd figure out what he had to do, and he'd do it.

It had started off as one little number, but it had grown into a full-blown show. Every time he was able to 'declare' a section ready, he was given a satisfaction which fuelled him toward moving along to another section. That didn't happen too often, of course. He'd discovered himself to have a bit of a meticulous streak in doing all this.

He'd gotten to spending a number of hours in the auditorium. When he got into his bubble, feeling the energy and the ideas flowing, he wouldn't want to stop or leave. Eventually though, he'd have to head on home.

His little brother vaguely knew about all this. Mike knew he could tell him little things here and there and it would stay between them.

It was him who had come up with the nickname. He'd come running down the stairs into the basement one day, toppling on to the couch next to Mike, who was playing a video game. He'd just sat there, staring at his big brother until he paused the game and looked over at him. The boy was not a big talker – part of the reason Mike was comfortable to share with him. When Mike had paused the game, his brother had come forth and whispered into his ear.

The Leaping Lords of Chang.

Mike smirked, looking back at him. He held out his hand, and he got a high five. He gave him another controller, and they got to playing the game together.

In his secret ideas, his brother was one of the dancers in his project. He hoped maybe he could loosen him up, open him up to the world. He was so quiet, and not many people got to know what a great kid he was, the way Mike did. That was another thing that made the project so important.

THE END


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